Kulusuk

Kulusuk Reviews

Summer in June. I was in Iceland and I saw that there was a two-hour Fokker plane ride from Reykjavik to Greenland! The place is called Kulusuk, a small settlement of eastern Greenland. Its 300 Inuit inhabitants are descended from the Thule culture that had spread east from the area that is now western Alaska in around 1000.

At the small airport, we were met by French and Italian guides. We walked on the unpaved road and snow for less than an hour to reach the town. The walk was enjoyable because of amazing views of mini-icebergs and Arctic flowers. With the eerie howls of dogs in the distance, we passed a cemetery of white wooden crosses and colorful flowers with a backdrop of snowcapped mountains.

From afar, the Inuit houses looked like small red, blue, yellow or green toy homes. There was a small post office with an adjacent grocery, and a church with the image of Christ and a miniature ship hanging on the wall near the altar.

We were brought to a natural ledge overlooking the ocean where an Inuit performed a drum-and-war dance while another expertly maneuvered a seal-skin kayak while throwing a spear. The view was surreal.

My major souvenir from this place was a tupilak, a troll-like creature handcrafted by the locals from the bones or teeth of animals such as deer and polar bears. I chose one made from a deer, which is supposed to give me good luck.

There is a hotel in Kulusuk if you want to stay overnight, but I took the plane back to Reykjavik that evening. The next day, my tupilak brought me good luck when I went to the fishing port of Husavik, Iceland, and saw two blue whales.